He addresses the newly-elected head of the Communist Party, Xi Jinping, who was confirmed during the ruling party's once-in-a-decade leadership change last month.

"Dear Mr Xi Jinping, the whole nation is watching you. Whether you will follow the call of heaven and people to carry out reform, or kidnap the government and maintain the power of the Communist Party, it is a matter of whether China will have the transition in a peaceful way or a violent way," Mr Chen said.

In the video, he also cited examples of political changes happening in other countries like Burma.

"If Thein Sein can do it, yet Xi Jinping doesn't, obviously it's not that Xi couldn't do it, but simply that he wouldn't. And that will speak volumes to who he is as a person and as a leader," he said.

Chen Guangcheng, a self-taught lawyer, has campaigned against forced abortions under China's one-child policy and was jailed for four years in 2006 for disrupting traffic and damaging property.

He was placed under house arrest after his release in 2010.

He is currently in the US, with his wife and two children, studying at the New York University School of Law.

In August, after meetings in the US Congress, the activist urged Washington to investigate his case and protect his family at home in China's Shandong province.

Mr Chen said Beijing had not fulfilled guarantees made to him about his own treatment and his family's security when he left China